1
ADELINE
It was half past six,and the bar was filling up with patrons I didn’t want to serve.Where the hell is Frankie?This was the second time this week she was late for her evening shift.
“Can I get a Coors Light, darlin’?”
I lifted my eyes to the burly man across the bar and gave him a tight smile.
“Coming right up.”
He winked and waved a five-dollar bill before slamming it on the polished wood counter. I hoped that meant he didn’t want his change.
At this hour, the bar was in a state of transition. The daytime regulars were being replaced by the evening ones, as well as a crowd of visitors and college students home for the summer. River Valley wasn’t a big tourist draw, but we got a few folks coming in July and August for the garden tours of the Tulson Estate. It was a big old mansion built about a hundred years ago, with manicured grounds and impeccable landscaping. At night, the trees were lit with colorful lights, and even I enjoyed going there from time to time. Molly and I had gone to see the lights last week.
The door of the bar swung open, revealing a frazzled Frankie, who gave me an apologetic look. “I’m so sorry,” she mouthed.
I shrugged and waved in response. Sure, I was irritated, but I wasn’t going to be an asshole to a single mom who was constantly trying to balance a dozen things at once.
A few minutes later, she emerged from the side door behind the bar.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered again, grabbing my wrist to give it a friendly squeeze. “The girls threw a tantrum when the babysitter came. I literally had to pry their little fingers off to leave. You’re so lucky that Molly is a functioning adult who can take care of herself.”
I froze. It wasn’t intentional. Just an instinctual reaction to someone implicitly telling me I was lucky to have been left with a teenage sister when our parents died.
Frankie felt the change in me and paled. “Shit.”
“It’s fine.”
“No, it’s not. I don’t know what I’m saying. Of course, you’re not lucky to be left to take care of her. My mind is all over the place, and I’m just being an idiot. I’m sorry.”
I swiped my palm across my face. “Look, don’t worry about it. It’s really okay. I do need to go though, so I’ll see you Monday?”
Frankie bit her lip, looking at me with pity in her eyes. I didn’t need to see that.
“Of course. Have fun at the show tomorrow. You’re going to kill it.”
“Thanks,” I said, this time making an effort to give her a warmer smile. I knew she hadn’t meant anything malicious with her earlier comment, but it had stung, nonetheless. Losing my parents two years ago, being left with a younger sister to take care of, and trying to figure out how to pay for her to go to college next year? Yeah, I sure as hell didn’t feel very lucky.
The sun wouldn’t set for another hour, and I decided to take the scenic route home. Molly was waiting for me, so I sent her a text to let her know I’d be late. I needed some time to think, and I didn’t want to do it at home where my sister always managed to read my worries like they were written with a Sharpie across my face.
My mind went to the letter we had gotten in the mail this morning. Molly’s application for a student loan had been denied after I’d been deemed not a creditworthy guarantor. It shouldn’t have caught me by surprise. I’d missed deadlines on payments for months after Mom and Dad died, too consumed with grief to worry about my falling credit score.
Now I was paying for that careless mistake. My life was a mess. I was twenty-one, with a high school diploma, and a rapidly depleting savings account. Our parents’ life insurance policy had covered us for a few years, but I’d checked the balance a week ago and knew it would barely cover Molly’s first year of tuition, even with the scholarship she’d gotten. In a few weeks, she’d leave for college, and then I’d have a year to figure out how to pay for the rest.
Molly had seen the letter before I could try to hide it from her. She’d said she could defer college for a year, find a part-time job, and take online courses until she could pay her own way.That had earned a strong “Hell, no” from me. I wasn’t going to let her make the same mistakes I had, and that was the end of it. Although, Molly was already in a much better place than I’d been at her age. She had applied to multiple schools, been accepted to a few, and picked an option that suited her. And me? I had put all my hopes and dreams into a single institution, only to discover that sometimes things didn’t work out as planned, no matter how badly you wanted them to.
I was so sure I’d get in to Julliard. I wanted to study music—to play my guitar and to meet people who loved the instrument as much as I did. My confidence had been enough to convince my parents that it would all work out just fine. But I hadn’t anticipated how putting so much significance on one audition would sabotage me.
The rejection letter had hurt my parents almost as much as it had hurt me. It had been an icy knife plunged into my heart. I often wondered how a letter worded so impersonally had decimated me like it did.
I’d stopped playing for six months after that. Couldn’t do it. Couldn’t touch my guitar. It had sat in the corner of my room, patiently waiting for me to befriend it again. Eventually, I did. It had just never felt the same.
My phone buzzed in the cup holder, saving me from further reliving painful memories. It was a message from Mason.
“Get-together at the pit tonight. Come hang out :).”
I didn’t want to text and drive, so I tapped on the call icon to dial.
